Palestinians killed in day of violence

A Palestinian boy standing on the roof of his uncle's shop on the edge of the West Bank city of Nablus was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers, according to members of his family.

Israeli soldiers said the boy, Amjad Musri, 15, was throwing rocks at troops below. Palestinian witnesses said he was not.

About the same time, soldiers opened fire on two men - a Palestinian they said had a pistol and was running towards armoured vehicles, and a man who was lighting a petrol bomb - an Israeli military spokesman said.

Palestinian hospital officials said both men were killed. They identified them as Amer Arafat, 18, and Rohi Hazen Shoman, 20.

Three hours after the incidents on Saturday, relatives and angry residents gathered in a funeral procession to bury Amjad and the two men.

As the crowd moved briskly along a major thoroughfare in Nablus, Israeli soldiers who had taken positions in a nearby building began shooting into the crowd, according to Ghadeer Musri, 35, a cousin of Amjad Musri.

The military spokesman said troops fired into the crowd because two men in the procession left the group and started approaching nearby soldiers. The spokesman said that, like the men who were killed, one of these men had a pistol and the other had a petrol bomb.

For most of the past 19 days, Israeli tanks, armoured jeeps and foot patrols have conducted some of the heaviest operations in Nablus in a year. An Israeli military spokesman said that the operations were aimed at "the terrorist infrastructure inside Nablus and the refugee camps".

The spokesman said soldiers fired only after they came under attack. He said troops were attacked numerous times by Palestinians throwing stones and attempting to set off explosive devices.